The Valentine’s Day countdown in on! Now that we have the Super Bowl out of our way and all related recipes have been posted it’s clearly time to move on to the next chapter: Valentine’s Day recipes. I’ll try not to go crazy with sugary treats this year but I do have a couple of surprises up my sleeve. Not so surprisingly though they all contain chocolate.

Of course we could spend Valentine’s Day eating mixed salads, sipping sparkling water and having a fruit salad for dessert. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that, in fact to me that is a great meal. But not on Valentine’s Day. Valentine’s Day has to include at least one meal containing chocolate.

I know a lot of people like to go with a theme of red or pink but I like to stick to dark chocolate, though just for the record, I’d never turn down a piece of red velvet cake. This cupcake is extremely moist and the vanilla-mascarpone filling adds a touch of creamy deliciousness. The reason why my favorite “cake” is actually tiramisu is because I love its texture. Cakes can sometimes be a bit dry, lacking moisture and a frosting doesn’t really make up for that. These cupcakes however were the opposite. They were juicy and I think the quark made all the difference.

Although I haven’t tried it myself the batter could easily be doubled or even tripled and filled into two or three cake tins. Stack the separate cakes and generously slather a good amount of vanilla mascarpone in between each layer. Add the ganache on top, sprinkle with the toasted coconut and you have yourself a pretty delicious cake. The cupcakes are pretty good too though!

In a small saucepan melt the better and add in the sugar. Once melted pour into a large bowl and using a hand mixer beat for approximately 3 minutes. Then add one egg at a time and beat well between each addition. Add the vanilla extract and cocoa mixture and beat once more.

Then add in the flour and beat slowly {to not get flour all over your kitchen}. Once incorporated increase speed and beat for a couple seconds on high. Then add in the quark. Beat until combined.

Divide the batter evenly among the 12 liners and bake for approximately 20-25 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.

While the cupcakes are the oven you can prepare the filling. Using a hand mixer whisk the heavy cream until soft peaks form. Then add in the mascarpone and beat on low speed. Add in the seeds from 1 vanilla pod and continue mixing until clump-free. Set aside or store in the fridge until cupcakes have cooled completely.

Once the cupcakes have cooled cut them open in the middle. Add 1-2 tablespoons of the filling to the bottom half of the cake and then cover with the other half.

To prepare the ganache cut the dark chocolate into small bits. In a saucepean bring the heavy cream to a simmer. Let simmer for approximately 4 minutes. Then set-aside and add in chocolate chunks. Make sure that the chocolate is covered with cream but do not stir!!! Do not stir for at least 5 minutes!!! Only after 5 minutes stir the ganache using a spatula. If necessary cool for a bit.

Drizzle 2 tablespoon of ganache on top of each cupcake. If desired sprinkle with toasted coconut.

7 Comments

How beautiful!! I am sure they are tasty too! 🙂 We don’t have quark in the US, at least not that I am aware of. What would be a good replacement for the quark, cottage cheese or ricotta cheese? This goes in my recipes to try pile. 🙂